The impact of COVID-19 on our way of life is yet to be fully understood. However, social psychology theory and research offer insights into its effect on social attitudes and behaviors, and here we gather the views of a unique group of experts in group processes and intergroup relations. Group processes and intergroup relations are major factors in social resilience and change arising from the COVID-19 pandemic. This special issue was developed to foreground the crucial role of group processes and intergroup relations in the COVID-19 pandemic. This article provides an overview of the areas explored in the special issue. First, we focus on the impact on societies, covering the evolution of intergroup processes during the pandemic, leadership, social connectedness, cultural differences in responses, and social development. Second, we turn to intergroup inequality and focus on gender inequality, ageism, xenophobia, and racial bias during COVID-19. Third, we explore worldviews during the pandemic, specifically conspiracy theories, science skepticism, and existential threat. Finally, we focus on the pandemic’s impact on behaviors, covering virtual working, social activism, virtual ostracism, and conformity and deviance. We finish with a discussion of the value of social psychology in helping us understand the impact of COVID-19 on social attitudes and behavior. As this special issue shows, group processes and intergroup relations are central to the ways that individuals and society is dealing with the challenges of this pandemic.

Previous research has examined the impact of stereotypes on outcomes such as career progression and hiring decisions. We present a novel approach to examine the role of stereotypes in predicting self-rated leadership potential across gender and age groups. This research sheds light on the impact of leadership-incongruent and detrimental stereotypes about one's gender and age, for women and older workers, on self-ratings of leadership potential. Across three studies (total N = 640), correlational and experimental evidence shows differential effects of stereotypes about women (vs. men) and older (vs. younger) people on self-ratings of their own leadership potential. Results suggest that both gender and age stereotypes affect older workers more than their younger counterparts (Study 1). Specifically, effects on self-rated leadership potential at the intersectional level show that endorsement of stereotypes has opposite effects on older women to younger men (Study 1). Furthermore, stereotyped workplace cultures impacted women's and older worker's perceptions of job fit (Studies 2 and 3), also extending to job appeal for older workers (Study 3). Results are discussed in terms of career implications for both women and older workers, with a particular focus on older women, whose intersecting identities are leadership stereotype-incongruent.

A large-scale field experiment tested psychological interventions to reduce engine idling at long-wait stops. Messages based on theories of normative influence, outcome efficacy, and self-regulation were displayed approaching railway crossing on street poles. Observers coded whether drivers (N = 6,049) turned off their engine while waiting at the railway crossings (only 27.2% did so at baseline). Automatic air quality monitors recorded levels of pollutants during barrier down times. To different degrees, the social norm and outcome efficacy messages successfully increased the proportion of drivers who turned off their engines (by 42% and 25%, respectively) and significantly reduced concentrations of atmospheric particulate matter (PM2.5) two meters above ground level. Thus, the environment was improved through behavior change. Moreover, of both theoretical and practical significance there was an 'accelerator effect', in line with theories of normative influence whereby the social norm message was increasingly effective as the volume of traffic increased.